So as mentioned in the last post; my name is Martha and I’m a Transgender Woman (Tranny as I will refer to myself from now on). I was born on the outskirts of Liverpool, England in the mid 1970’s. Born into a dichotomy (big words?) were Men worked either on the docks, with a spanner & ratchet, or down a mine. Women were still to be found at home or, for those brave enough, a cursory job on the Radio blowing Taxi’s to their pickup and drop off points. Men were Men and Women were in the Kitchen, and that was the way it was. Anything else just wasn’t Rugby…

Now a family member identified as Homosexual; my Uncle. Now known as Christine – ask me not when his name was Peter, because I’ll never be able to answer you. But he was a brilliant drag act, took to the stage amazingly well; people from all over the country came to see him – They ran a mile when he lifted his skirt (or their shirt) but that’s a completely different story. However, in the local community, he was ostricised. Nobody would speak to him only family members and close friends. That hurt me to watch and when I realised I was different, I also realised I couldnt go throught that.

I didn’t need to, my childhood was horrific enough as it was. My brother was a constant bully, my sister was constantly whinging at my mum, my step dad was constantly trying to keep the peace and my mum just gave up & went to work to get out of the way of it all. Life was good financially but hard socially.

I was bullied, horribly – The details are not for this post. I became a geek in order to hide from it all and was bought countless technical toys to do as I pleased with. Most ended up in bits at the hands of my brother but you can’t have everything. I hit a career in technology and did rather well for myself at one point; even elevating myself into the middle classes (woo hoo). But that didn’t last, something was never quite right. I mean, maybe it had something to do with that right wrist; can’t be certain but I remeber breaking it when I was a child and it never recovered, it was always limp…

So computers didn’t work out, life sucked, I’d had enough and I moved away – Best thing I ever did. Moved out to the green jungle that is the east of england; and settled in a village on the outskirts of a small town not too far from the coast, known as Peterborough.

Well I got out of IT and took a job with a HR company. Why HR? No idea but it paid reasonably well and they were probably about the only employer in the area who would take me on. So I settled into the job, life settled down, all fine and dandy.

Nah, something was wrong.

Maybe it had something to do with the 10 inch, black, vibrator I found myself using a lot when I was stressed? Not sure, but coming from such a dichotomy; Men didn’t use such tools on themselves. They had a tendency to advertise they had one, usually strapped between their legs but they weren’t the recipient of its services. That fantastically improbably feat lay to the women. Of which I was beginning to wonder about myself; limp wrist, 10 inch co.. I mean vibrator, sway when I walk, you know; random signs (gangnam style – hey! sexy lady!) ahem.

So one day, I left work and decided I was going to sort it out once and for all. I was going to have a weekend to remember; if I could and stuff the consequences, that way I’d know for sure. Man, woman or beast; come and get it, or give it, anything goes… And it did. A long way actually – 200 miles to be precise. The only clear memory I have of that weekend was waking up midweek to my boss screaming at me down the phone as I hadn’t been seen for 4 days.

The fact that I was semi-naked in my car; on the sea front, in the resort town of Brighton with my 10… well, speaks for itself. Phone down, new call. Doctors.

“Hi, do you have any appointments available for tomorrow morning please?”, I said.

“We do”, came the reply, “But it will be with the new trainee doctor who has just qualified? Would that be OK?”

“Sure”, I said, “Why not, if no one else can fathom out whats wrong. May as well give the newbie a shot”

And the appointment was arranged.

The following day I turned up and went into the consulting room. Sure as you can bet you have a mother, she was new. I’m not sure about the green as we sit here today; but she was definitely cabbage looking – If she was any more scared of a patient she’d have ran a mile. But she greeted me with a smile, and she was really nice to me. I wasn’t to her though; not at the start:

“Hi, my name is Jennifer. What seems to be the problem?”, she said warmly.

“I woke up on Brighton seafront with a 10 inch vibe inserted into me, yesterday morning – Do I strike you as Gay?”, I said in return.

“No”, she said, “But I’d pretty much formed an opinion of you straightaway. And from that sentence I think I might be right. Lets go into a bit more detail..”

Erm.. What!

“Hi, this is doctor Lopez. Can you clear my patients this afternoon? I think I’ve found what I’m looking for and I’ll need to spend some time with this patient.”, She said to the receptionist when she answered the intercom.

Oh fuck, who is this woman? And what have I said??

“No problem Doctor Lopez, I’ll transfer your patients to Doctor Houston and I’ll leave you to get on with it.”

She turned to me and said: “Right, start at the beginning. Where you born again?”…

I am seeing a doctor, right? Not a shrink? No? Sure? I’m a bit confused. And that’s exactly what she said to me. You are a bit confused missus. What! Why is she referring to me in these terms? Missus, Hun, Darling, is she for real…

So I explained everything that I mentioned up above, in a lot more detail. And she continued to refer to me using female pronouns. And about two hours in by head is starting to hurt. I’ve got a banging headache, proper hurts. I’m in tears after reciting some of the things that I thought I’d never need to recite again (for some reason, I just did it? I can’t explian why). And if I was confused when I walked in the door, two hours later; I was a mess. I can’t recite the conversation as I can’t remember it but I don’t think it was all for public consumption anyway. She had a lot of notes in front of her, so I’m sure If I asked to see them…

“Seriously”, she said, “You’re a woman. Now I know this is going to be hard to accept but there is a diagnosis that I have for you. And once you have it, and you start to deal with it; trust me when I tell you things will improve for you”.

“Fuckoff”, was my response, “Are you fucking serious?”

“Most definitely.”, said she, “You have a condition known as Gender Dysphoria”

“Gender fucking what!”.

“Gender Fucking Dysphoria”, was the response.

I’d never had a doctor talk to me like that before! And not least one half my age!!

Well, do you know what? I actually don’t remember what happened next and I don’t know if I want to make anything up about it either. I could do, I could say; for example, that I floated back to my car and it elevated itself off the road to a height of 200 meters and set about it’s course home, jet engies off. But it didn’t. I walked out of of the consulting room with an appointment for a senior doctor and a counselling session and that’s all I remember.

What I do know; is, that day, that one sentence changed my whole life. It was never going to be the same again. It set me off on a course of adventures I never believed were possible until that point.